Calling all Culverts

Culvert curation--everything you need to know with field expert and HDPE veteran, Don McGriff. The benefits of slip-lining with Snap-Tite and Spirolite to rehabilitate ailing culverts - detailing the low-impact, long-term solution that improves on the original.

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Welcome back to ISCO Insights podcast. Our newest episode is going to focus on Culvert Rehabilitation and we are thrilled to bring in our local expert, Don McGriff. Don, thank you so much for your time. We really appreciate. It. Yeah, Joy, you being here. Tell me, just give me some background on you. We talked a little bit about your initial aspirations to head into space, but the big story of those plans a little bit, but maybe some of your experience, HDPE Yeah. So I finished college actually before I was finished in college, I started in a little polyethylene company called Fluid Controls, which eventually was acquired by ISCO in 99. But so since I worked out of the same location since finishing college, so I've done HDPE for over 30 years, done a number of different technical aspects in in supporting, you know, polyethylene and its uses and its installation and fabrication from, you know, the industrial municipal to landfill to geothermal nuclear culvert rehab, which I've supported for a number of years, and then had the opportunity last year to kind of start in sales also so been involved with a number of things there And, you know, doing the trade organizations associated with that, whether we asked him or he saw me or ESI or Astro just. Yeah. So technically kind of cut my teeth there. And then when I figured out how to, you know, talk to people, I wanted to be himself at some point. That's a that's. Fantastic. Obviously very seasoned. I'm just the opposite. New to the industry, you've been around, you're at a disco for about nine months, but I think I talk to people about it. They say Culverts. What are we talking about? Culbertson As I've done the research. Federal and state funding is is headed that way. And there are a lot of problems with culverts, whether it's the timing or the shelf life of the installs that were put in. But there's a lot of failing culverts around the country in and around the nation. Yeah, there's a lot of infrastructure dollars out there and most of that's gone to things that are seen. So you're seeing a lot of roadways that are being repaved. Unfortunately, you know, the maintenance crews for whether it be a dot or county or city, whatnot, you know, they're still strapped a little bit. They're trying to find funds that some are proactive about their culverts. Some are just waiting till they can have more time or have more money or have more manpower. A number of different reasons why they may not want to go look. What they know is is is a problem, uh, kind of a ticking time bomb. You know, there's probably a little bit more attention to bridges because bridges fail. It's a little bit more catastrophic than, say, a culvert. But a culverts are going to do a fair amount of damage as well. And something I've kind of stumbled across, too, is sometimes it is. They know about it and they just want to put it off. Sometimes it's they're maybe not really aware of how poorly the culvert is doing or how it's failing. Yeah, there's all sorts of situations depending upon like I said, I think many know, but if they if they don't feel like they're going to have the funding. Michael Look. Sure, sure. So just for a simple definition, I think people that even think they don't know what a culvert is, know what a culvert is like, give me a rough definition. Yeah, you can think of it as a pipe on a road, but really, it's a it's a conduit that allows typically water, stormwater, water runoff go from from one side of a road or railroad or a road up airport runway. There's there's culverts and levees and dams. So it's just a matter of channeling typically rainwater or stormwater that's come from some direction. And, you know, it's got to go eventually back to some sort of body of water or stream or lake or something like that. And our roads create essentially small dams. Yeah, for that. So and then your point about the stormwater and the rainwater being the source kind of puts an exclamation point on maybe the awareness of when they need to be addressed, because sometimes it's not until that surge that water really comes in, you realize, okay, we've got some deterioration, we've got a clog, we've got other problems with it. Yeah, not always active. Yeah, sometimes, you know, the culverts are dry. They're only active, you know, after a rain. And then, you know, once the rains mean drops. But some of them are part of the whole stream bed. So it's just a matter of, you know, where the, where the water is coming from. Groundwater, rain, water, some other source. I wouldn't put a percentage on it, but I think just from EIS, corrugated metal and cement kind of concrete are basically the primary and culverts. Oh yeah, those are the two materials, definitely. You've got some older stuff, some some clay and some brick. You know, you'll typically find that in the Northeast where the infrastructure is substantially older than the southeast, the west, whatnot. But corrugated metal was was very popular in the fifties, sixties and seventies. And so those were hitting those design life. They weren't protected, they weren't galvanized or boxer coated like they are now. So you've got a lot of unshielded metal and then the concrete does fairly well in some situations that, you know, aggressive soles or aggressive going back to, you know, rain water where you talk about acid rain, things like that. There's some there's some concrete culverts that have swallowed it and things like that. But between those two, you're going to find most of them. You'll see within the last 20 or 30 years the switch over to a corrugated plastic walkway that HDPE not quite the same thing that we'll talk about in a in a minute, but because it's a little bit more corrosion resistant, abrasion resistant. Sure. Has there been an impact on culverts and their failures because of population growth and heavier traffic on some of these roads and maybe the consideration not being put in during the install years and years ago potentially? Yeah. There's um, you know, as you create more, um, subdivisions and things like that, you're going to increase the groundwater, you increase the runoff. So you're going to, you're going to increase load. Now that may be good or bad depending upon the situations or. Some of the considerations. Then when you're talking about a culvert trying to decide if it's it's a rehab, if it's a repair or if it's a replacement. Obviously, the size, the length, the depth is probably going to be the primary. What are some other considerations? Oh, there's lots of them. You know, the whether there's utilities involved or the amount of traffic that may be involved in a roadway, sometimes the roadways not get a lot of traffic, but it's the only way into a subdivision. Therefore, there may be a lot of traffic. You think about a a road that goes into a state park. That's typically one way in, one way out. Sure. So, you know, that may not be a lot of cars, but that's the only way they're going to go. So that becomes the so detours become a headache. You can talk about environmental concerns, you know. And that's become a big one. Oh, yeah. There's the the sustainability, the the environmental impact, the lots of terms out there that catch people's attention. Sure. Sustainability, you know, But, you know, there's there's the hydraulics that matter. You know, you get a failing culvert or you get water that's bypassing it. You know, when you're designing to repair the place, you know, we're going to go back with the same amount. You know, like I said, it was put in 30 years ago, and then we figured we'd have ten subdivisions feeling that, yeah, one culvert. So they get a little undersized in some cases. Um, you know, there's the, the structural capacity, you know, it's a two lane road now. It's a four lane highway. Um, you know, typically that shouldn't be a concern, but sometimes it can be. And then you just get the design life and the cost of, of should I take it up? Should I replace it? Should we have. It? Good old time and money is always coming in. Yeah, no question about it. So when we look at solutions, obviously if if a replacement is one necessary or two possible, logistically speaking, I would guess that is the best solution from a duration standpoint. But it's really challenging in terms of get is involved. Again, it depends on those conditions. So, you know, if the culverts collapse, it's probably a good time to replace it. You know, there's not much you can do with it with a rehab or realign method. If it's low volume, low traffic, it's convenient for a D.O.T. or roadway to go by, you know, to go and dig it up within a half day, because that's what they do every day. The deeper gets, the more challenging. You know, you talk about shoring and and roadways and things like that that makes things more complex. Again, we talked about increasing the capacity you got from a small culvert to a big culvert or small culvert to a bridge. You know, sometimes those are justified and needed. Um, so there's a number of reasons to, to replace that might make sense, but typically what you're talking about with with repair or replace is there's some sort of economic advantage, maybe not immediately aware to people, but there is an advantage to doing that. Sure. So spot repairs, close fit liners and slip lining are kind of the triumvirate of of rehabilitation means or is that accurate to just in general. That's just kind of three three buckets we've kind of talked about, you know, a spot repair, typically something that doesn't address the entire culvert. Sure. There's two or three things there. You know, the joints separated. You put in a new pipe. But some reason wasn't backfilled correctly. The joints kind of separate. You might could do a a simple joint sleeve, something that's not structural, but, you know, keeps the water out, keeps water flowing through across groundwater out, keeps water flowing through it. Yeah. Um, you know, there's grout that may stabilize the soil or, you know, prevent a crack from further, you know, getting water in or or developing paved inverts or common spot repair, paving inverts or, you know, something where the bottom's kind of rusted. The rest of it's fine, but you know, where the water sits, maybe probably doesn't move very fast. It comes in and sits in a lot of deterioration. So in May give some life and at a cost or, you know, conveniently something that somebody can do because they can get in and they can, you know, lay a new bottom to. Yeah, yeah. Close fit liners we're talking about basically whether it be the fabric or the the infused materials or some sort of spray on your you're putting a new liner in the culvert, is it in general. I guess it's we're talking about I think there's probably, I guess three primary close bid liners. That the we call them hospital liners, because it's a a designation the Corps of Engineers likes to use. Okay. They consider close fitting light or something that's going to, you know, basically move up against or be installed up against the existing wall, the host. And it's something that's going to be it's attractive hydraulically because it is reducing the idea the minimal amount you're talking about something that um that it's pulled in but again expand it up against the existing host. So you know you're talking about curtain places is is one a folded form is is another and it's a spray a pipeline or a staple is the typically three that fit in that bucket. Now I know with with the slip lining with HDPE you're looking at the opportunity to have that smooth wall interior improved the improved the flow rate with these three opportunities, are you replicating that corrugated metal then with the replacement or is there maybe a chance to improve the flow a little bit? Typically there's there's likely a flow improvement. Um, one, because when you're putting these close fit liners, they don't always fit exactly into the hills and valleys, let's say, of a bit of metal. So they're going to you may still see some sort of undulation, but not to the same extreme with a spray applied. You know, they typically kind of spray it until it gets smooth on the exterior. Now it's a it's a suspension. So it does have some roughness to it that say a folded form, which is a PVC pipe. You know, it's going to be very smooth from a from a thermoplastic standpoint, but it is going to have a little bit of undulation than, say, a standard PVC pipe that you might see in a home improvement store. Okay. The curtain place again, is it's going to follow that contour a little bit, but even it out a little bit. And I think we make this clear on the podcast and other insights that, you know, we're here as a function of informing and all of the solutions we speak to could be perfect for your situation based on all of the circumstances. Obviously, the one that we have a vested interest in is one we're going to talk about a little more. But, you know, one of these might be the perfect answer to your questions. And so we we don't want to speak, you know, in terms of negatives. And we're not we're not trying to sell against these. We're just trying to inform of, you know, positives and negatives and to know that the trade offs. Like with a close fit launch system, is it works well. And in a closed system, things that don't have a lot of access. So you think about something that goes for a man, hold a manhole catch based on the catch basin. You know, most time we're talking about culverts, they're open ended, but sometimes we're talking about storm drainage pipes that are alongside of the roadway. And so you never see the entrance and exit that some of these concrete boxes that may exist. And and so when that flexible liner can can make a 90 degree turn pretty quickly versus versus a hard pipe like the slip letters that need a little bit more room anywhere from 10 to 30 feet that we may be dealing with with our saltwater. Yeah, it's good to have a number of tools in the toolbox that fit based upon the, you know, where you can accept the tradeoffs. But with all of those close fit, you're not going to address any of the structural integrity of the pipe and and surrounding areas, so to speak. It's a it's a it's a conundrum within the industry. Sure. You know, there's some aspects where they call them nonstructural up to structural. The IWW gets involved because some of these methods started out with the old water and sewer rehabilitation methods with smaller diameter pipes, smaller bore, smoother bores, and that's been adapted over time for for culvert. And so they fit in and don't fit in the same categories. Sometimes, you know, people think I got a pretty good host, I'm going to do this as a as a new light, a new seal, a new liner or a new, you know, something to prevent corrosion. And if the the existing culvert is not that far gone, it may not be a terrible idea. One of the things that we contend is sometimes these erosions are to fork on and you put one of these methods in and it basically holds the ground water in and it basically exacerbates the corrosion. So you kind of have to decide. I've seen some references where, you know, someplace say that, you know, a synapse, a good reinforcing material, but it's not really considered structural. I've seen an article last month, an underground infrastructure. We would talk about just the lack of guidelines for design and install and just a number of factors that say, say people shouldn't be considered structural at this point. There are factors that go into the design of, you know, they start with, you know, swimming around. And most of the failing infrastructure is not around anymore. It's it's elliptical, it's got some sort of deflection. And those deflections are where things can create some issues. Sure, groundwater can create some issues freestyle, especially in northern environments Creek create a lot of issues. So so you get these we like to tell people like, you know, don't just take the word for a vendor, you know, yeah, we've got a design methodology, you know, check us out, see if we missed something in some way for these other methods. Again, everything fits. Just needs to make sure that, you know, does it fit in the way that you think it should? And I know that if there's a particularly environmentally sensitive setting that you're attempting to work on this culvert too, that there are and have been some documented chemical concerns with some of these other matters of repair. Yeah. So the scope has a starring component. You know, they're typically ester resins, vinyl, ester polyester, some of boxes. And so when they're cured as a form of, you know, making them from a pliable into a secured hardened thermoset form styrene to give it off now I think most of this on the non culvert is probably more pervasive. It you know sure you're dealing with small pipes so they use a lot of steam and and hot water and those are where the stories are a little bit more in controlled when you get into culverts you know something that's a little bit larger than maybe a sewer water force main. We're probably going to use a lot of UVA and UVB tends to it doesn't really let styrene out. The issue is you've got to make sure it's fully cured, otherwise they will still leach out. What's the water's there? So so the UVA makes a lot of sense from the the culvert rehab situation, but it's just not a slam dunk. I know that whatever the timeline is, ten, 15 years ago, the definition of large pipe was very different when it came to high density polyethylene, and that has expanded exponentially. I guess we're up to 120 or even bigger in terms of the diameter. That is one of the restrictions was some of these these close fit liners is that they're only going up to a certain diameter at this point in time. Well, they're expanding, too, I'm sure. Well, actually depends on the method. So for the essay pile where you're talking about something where you've got to spray as a light or cement, just, you know, there's a bottom in for it. Yeah, sure. They can go pretty big. The bigger it is, the more room they have for spraying it the by hand, by doing a spin, rotary spin, things of that nature. But yeah, the fold in forms typically a 36 inch I've heard talk about 42 and 48 but it's just not it's not as common in the industry. It just hasn't hit yet. But yeah, there's that. The cap goes from a low to it to large, but a lot of what I see is cap has a sweet spot for 48. It's down the cost, the headaches, the the logistics, so to speak, all kind of affect it as being more more economically justifiable as as as a low end to 48 ounce size. You touched on a little bit without saying it. But as we transition into slip lining, the one requirement you do have is is a bit of a staging area in order to accommodate that. But but in general, slip lining allows you to address not only the flow rate, not only the failure of the cover, but also some of the structural integrity with the grouting and the bulkheads as well. Yeah, primarily that advantages structural, you know, people people are comfortable with a pipe that's normally sold as a pipe, right? Yeah. So now it's just putting a pipe inside of the pipe. It's just making sure the hole is big enough for the pipe to slide through. So and the advantage of of a slip loader loose, least with the snap type in the spiral products that we talk about is that those things are extendable on each end. So, you know, when people are running short on shoulder or they want to go from a two lane road to a three lane or four lane, you know, they can line the host and leave the extra on the ends for however they need it, whether it be three feet or 30 feet. So, you know, they can vary that portion line the other end. So when they're done looking through that pipe, it's all continuous. So the structural is, is an aspect of, of the slope line and that makes sense to a lot of people. And I'm understanding that steel and then some reinforced plastics PVC but primarily HDPE are used and so. There are still a number of materials out there. The steel reinforced really is a good for a very tight pipe because it's got the resource on the outside. It's a little bit more cumbersome to get it installed, reverses a smooth exterior, smooth interior pipe that we were offering. But you know, every tool for the tool bag. But yeah, some of the other materials pbks use in a wound configuration can be a little finicky on durability. You know, you got to be a little bit more careful with that. That's my best contractor. Say, I love your product because I beat the crap out of it. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I'll have to modify my language. You know, they should. Yeah, but yeah, they, they, they drop it, they roll it. They, you know, they do some things that we don't recommend and it still survives. Yeah. But yeah. So the polyethylene, the thing about it is it's, it's, it's becoming universally accepted across a number of different markets and and this it offers some structural flexibility so some just robust characteristics but typically, you know in a financial or economic range that makes a lot of sense. Solid wall is. TMF 714 either mechanical joints that the snap type or board that I, I almost feel bad when I refer to SNAP as grown up Legos, but to an extent. I mean, as far as assembly goes, while it is much more complex than that, it is a simple process. You get the gasket on there, you get a little spray on there and you snap it in. Yeah. So the pipe normally is a heat fuze pipe for a lot of the applications because the heat fusion gives you a pressure component. We needed to make that a little bit more simplistic, especially for the end markets that we're using. We don't need the pressure capability, you know, so we lose that when we machine the male and female in. But we take something where you have a specific piece of equipment that might be requires some specific expertise. And again, some sort of logistics to be able to put the pipe and keep things clean and dry to make a heat fusion. We'll take all that away about by making a male female in and therefore the snap goes very quickly you know, minutes if you know, depending upon just how well someone's set up, how comfortable they are doing it, you know, they they'll struggle with the first one because they haven't seen it or only seen it on picture video. But once they get going, it's it's quick. And so we take that aspect out of it. You know, making it something where all they need is a little bit room and right away they're going to stick one joint and have enough sticking out that they can hold on to keep it restrained and pull the next joint. And and it's it's left, right, up and down, just trying to get your alignment and then it snaps the instantly well. And when you when you talk about it and I guess if we were grinding rewinding a little bit and it's easy for me to say you know, once you've assured that the culvert is clear of any debris, then you get the two by fours across top and bottom to kind of give yourself a a path. And you you are able to install that first piece of snapped, right. As you said, let's say you've got, you know, you know, 150 feet. I'm trying to recall if we're talking 25 foot or 40 foot sticks. Typically 20. Four. Yeah. So, you know, you put that first one in, you snap, the second one, you push it forward. I guess two things were I was impressed with when I've been on job sites is one, I feel like some of these other manners require pretty extensive training or maybe this doesn't work quite as extensive training. Now there's being good at something and being okay at something. But but also in terms of the speed with which it can be installed is when you've got a really good crew, it doesn't take a lot of time. Well, some of the other methods can't go quick. But, you know, we talked about training, you know, typically with some of these methods, you know, if you're the dot, you're the road crew, whatnot, you're just going to form it out. Sure. Because you're not going to buy the equipment. You're not going to do all the stuff to do a copy of all the form is going to farm it out. And what we tell people is, you know, everybody's concerned about Manpower and D.O.T. says, Well, I don't have the time. I don't have the manpower to do it. I'm like, Well, the same things are affecting you, affecting the contractors. So if you're going to want to farm it out, you're going to have to rely on a contractor who's not, you know, so shorthanded that they're going to put you out and you can't control it. So so we we promote the fact that simplistic it's something that typically needs a backhoe or tripod is going to help place it and snap it together. And then you're going to do a little bit of concrete work, whether it be the bulkhead through the grouting. You know, you mentioned something about boards, you know, boards or or are not always necessary. Okay. Yeah. Sometimes, you know, at least on the bottom. Well, the snapshot, those are the ones we do with Flood Street in even with a fairly deteriorated inversion, you know, as long as it's not going to get hung up on something. Supposed bolts or that. It will just, just drop out the bottom is so long that it can't, you know but if if the if the gasoline you know, 12 inches I got 24 it's just going to slide along those corrugations that the top you know sometimes you are going to put some some blocking in when you've got main entry, sometimes you get to strap the blocks to the pipe itself so you don't necessarily have to even, you know, install it there. And that's only when you want to try to keep it from floating to the top, sometimes inverts or the bottom, what we call the the bottom inside diameter, the pipe, the invert. You know, sometimes it doesn't matter if it's it's, it's as this place is sort of sitting up against the top of the other one. Sure. So sometimes that can make life easier. You just can't let the top of the pipe that probably has deteriorated set the new lay of the pipe. So it's not always even necessary that you have to do some of the things that we promote. You know, it depends upon what your needs, our sort of job. Job, the job makes sense. So with that, let let's imagine that we've done our snap date. We've snapped together those 24 foot lengths. We've got a decent amount of leeway on either side, depending on what we want to do with it. Lay some grout tubes, basically at some different intervals there, get the cement and create the bulkhead, which basically is sealing in any the space between the existing pipe and the new pipe. Yep. Let that cure and then you're pumping in grout in this crowd is really pretty incredible material. Well, it's really simplistic, but we can make it complex. But for depending upon again, the complexity of the existing pipe or host, you, most of these things are running under two lane roads 30, 40, 50 feet. So you could use something from a cement factory, you know, ready mix truck, you're typically going to get something that's low and aggregate. So you want something that's cement, water, cement, water, sand, cement, water and flash. You know, less than is probably better. But we promote a sailor grout that's typically, you know, advantageous when you're doing long big just because you can develop some pressures, you can develop some you want to make sure the stuff flows everywhere. So if you get too thick of it, of of a flow will fill a slurry mix. Slurry is kind of dangerous because sometimes those have a lot of aggregates, neat mixers or another term. You know, it's neat because it has no aggregate with low aggregate. So those things, you know, you can actually poured in If you've got access to the top end of the existing host, you could funnel a formal fill or a neat mix into and let it just travel down and fill up. You mentioned, you know, grout tubes. Grout tubes are typically when you used to inject it can be anywhere from one to a large number depending upon the length. The. Sure. And how thick that grout mix is, you know, a lot of them turn out and end up not being used. They're just safety factors for one to clog. And we got to come back next day and start again. You know, do we have an access to Jack? We do like to have vent tubes, which are just short tubes on each hand. And they turn they do let the air out, but they also serve as a verification of where that grout level is as you're filling up so that you can be certain what the most important would be at the top of the above the liner pipe in between the liner and host at the top at the inlet end, that's your highest point. And what you get grout up to that level, you're typically comfortable or confident that the grout has filled up mostly in space, if not all. You know. So grouting is that is a little different from the some of the other the methods, the grouting, you know, is basically most of the pipes there are style to consider. Flexible pipes. Flexible pipes do well over the pipes or interaction we're not using. So we use and grout just because it's easier place, easier flow and it has compressed properties that really are even higher than sole itself. So we're just adding a sole layer that happens to be cement ground. And obviously an environmentally friendly solution as well as for. The most part. Well, you've got to make sure you control it. That's probably where, you know, that's where people probably experience most headaches with slope liners, I'll be quite honest. Is it? You just don't know where all the voids are. You think you might know? Yeah. You go to ground, you get some grout coming out and places that you don't know. So I always try to make sure people think about their contingencies of what happens to the grout, comes out someplace other than the tubes where I'm looking for them to come, you know? Do you have a way to to stop it? Do you have a way to to address it? Do you have a way to contain it? You know, concrete shoes all over the place. So, you know, I like environmentally friendly. It's kind of a depends on who you're asking. Sure, Sure. Environmentalist don't like cement in their creeks and what. Yeah, but, you know, we're building daily thousands of things with concrete, so yeah, it's except. I'm like, I'm guessing the the front end and the assessment becomes very crucial in that case that you're aware of what you're looking at before you put the solution. Forward that build your bulk. You know, you've got to be sure that, you know, when you put this what we call an NCL way around, you know, have I got it? You have really compact it up underneath the lot in between the liner and the host, especially where I can't see very well because once you go to start grouting you've got a big concrete truck there, you know, you don't want to stop, you want to be able for him to empty. And if you start getting grout flowing somewhere that you weren't expecting again, that's a lot more about preparation and understanding what the what it was before you started. Absolutely. So as we move up to a profile wall and spiral, right. Getting into larger diameters as well, you just give me an overview of of the difference between snapped and Spiral because I know there's a lot of similarities, but there are differences. Yeah, most of you don't know that we do have two different products. There used to us for a number of years we were manufacturing snapped tight. It's a solid wall pipe material, typically 8 to 63 inches our range on that that's covered by the ash two and 326 standard. And that's a snap together product. We've seen a male or female in so that when it snaps together you get no change in the idea. No change in the o.D really works well for for a liner. But at some point, you know, there's a lot of culverts out there that go very large. And so we've been working with profile wall products spar a lot being chief among them that are an idea based and they go up to 120 years. Now they go, you know, as small as 18 inch. When we talk about culvert lining, we're really talking about something that's going to be 40 to 48, 54, mainly because because they have an army base, they may have some hydraulic advantage, but they're going to have a big road, a profile wall. It's kind of like a corrugated, at least as far as how people might view it. They see this smooth interior and kind of it's got a smooth exterior, but it's not as smooth as the interior. Sure. But basically what we're doing is we're laying a solid layer on a mandrill that mandrill sized. If you want to make a six foot pipe, you have a six foot steel mantel that can collapse out of the way. What you're done, you wrap a solid layer, then you wrap a core tube that spirals and slowly spirals around the pipe that that quarter was sized with a diameter little spacing that gives you different strength. So we can it's an engineered product. It's not like corrugated. We're what you get is what you get. And it either works or doesn't work. We can typically go very strong. We can we can do multiple layers with the core tube as we need to. And then we do that solid layer on top helps us a lot with the slope lining process. Keep that smooth exterior. We've done that now. We used to manufacture with the exposed core too, for some of our direct buried. Now most of it was manufactured with the solid layer on top or smooth layer on top. It's a bell speed connection. So it's not fully restrained. Joint both the snap tight in spotlight have a gasket. The gasket for the snap tied is essentially are keeping the grout out until things set up obviously will keep the flow of the water in. But the superlight has a gasket connection. But it's a bell spigot, so it's got a little bit of a larger body in some cases, depending on the size. It's not, not terribly. And then we might have to do some things. So we have a heat strength or some welding processes we can do to hold that pipe together because it's normally meant to be a direct buried pipe. When we go to flat lining, we're pushing and pulling. We're putting some different stresses on it. So the heat shrinker might be something that helps hold the joint through the installation. Doesn't need for a seal because the gasket provides know. But you know, if you go to push something in and it wants to back off a little bit naturally or you know, you can't hold the pressure up against it or you need to pull back because you've hit something that joint wall actually come apart. Not an issue when you're looking at direct bearing, but for some lining it's a different consideration. And you talk about direct bearing because firelight, while it is outstanding for culvert rehab as a number of of applications in terms of manholes and sewer in that it is it's very versatile material. It's been used for a lot of stuff long before we thought about putting it in for slope liners. You know, a lot of a sewer application, combined sewer overflows, the retention detention, make a lot of tanks out of it, you know, going up to 120 inch. We make a lot of detention tanks, so there's a lot of applications for. It going on mining, geothermal vaults. And it's it's really intriguing. Yep, that's something I've been involved. So make it something where it serves as a a structure, structural component to house some internal piping things of that nature. You know, we actually make the aquatic a we call it a alpi. The, the term in the industry is AOP for aquatic organism passive. Yeah. We have an aquatic life passive pipe. We're just trying to keep it separated so people aren't totally confused. Yeah, but essentially what we do is we, we make it, but we don't put that internal spoon layer. So you get an internal corrugated product, it gives you a chance for sediment to build up, to slow the water down. So you wouldn't use it from a hydraulic standpoint. But typically that's the big concern, that it will want it to go too fast for the fish or the Crawdads or whatever it is that maybe going from one side of a roadway to another. So you slow it down. We can put some baffling inside, create some resting pools, things of that nature. So we come back and use that product again. We find another engineered solution to help with that. But, you know, and it's it's something people need to sort of we do it for relining, but you could actually bury this if you're looking for a round solution that's that economical. I tell people the harsh reality is we can't replace every culvert that's failing with a bridge. We just don't have the the money to to build a bridge everywhere. We want to build a bridge for a fish, for raccoons, for whatever it needs to cross from one side, sure to the other. So this hopefully gives some people options that they'd consider. As a fly fisherman. I definitely appreciate that, and I understand the logic too, and I didn't really touch it. And I'm glad you brought that up because I was going to head that direction. We we talk almost exclusively about pipe, and usually when you're in the DP world, you talk about whys and t's and fittings and that, and it's just not really something that has that. But one of the features is the hydro bill, and that's something you put on the intake side on Snapchat. I know. Yeah, it's that tight actually. You know, we didn't talk, we don't talk about it, but we're developing a capability to make one for the spiral out as well. So, okay, so no matter what pipe size, at least maybe up to a certain point, we have some manufacturing limitations. So it might be a 96 inch or 84 inch where we top out. But yeah, hydro wells, basically we're replacing this with a smooth pipe. We talked about a lot of people choose close fit liners because the hydraulic advantages view it as being hydraulic with superior and it may have some superior, but in essence, when you go with a snap out of superlight and you put it inside a corrugated metal, you're going to improve the flow from a pipe capacity standpoint. So when people think my only option for hydraulically is a close fit liner, they haven't looked at the the Mannings comparison. Now, fortunately, you know, hydraulics is not just all about the pipe, the pipe capacity. Sometimes it's controlled by how water gets into the pipe, how water exits. The pipe is called inlet control outlet control, very complex subjects. I don't pretend to know as much as I want to about them, but you know, inlet control basically is what headwater develops over the interests of the pipe. You get some sort of how to liquid and water just will not flow through, get into the pipe as efficiently as it needs to. The hydro is essentially a funnel. It helps funnel the water and so that you're taking advantage of the for pipe capacity. Everybody says, hey, how can I get more or more flow through a pipe? And that's kind of a misnomer. You can't get more than the pipe can have the capacity to do from a from Manning standpoint. But you can't help make sure that you're using all the capacity. But by dealing with inlet control and as far as I know, we're the only lightning solution that provides an intimate control options. So I think it's worthwhile to consider, you know, it may be something that hydraulically if you develop some head water, it's not a big deal. You've got enough depth on the south road. It's not a concern and a big one. It may not be a concern, but except for that 20 or 50 or 100 year flood, you know, and that's enough to create some damage and it's going to help. You know, it's still got to straight back up possibly. Yeah. I know a lot of people really base their life on common sense and logic. And I mean, if you and I both had a container with a small opening, we were both pouring water into it. I had a funnel and you didn't. I'm going to win. Yeah. You know, And so the logic is there and that's fantastic. Well, my, my bare drinking friend was like to say it reduces the glug glug. Well phrase, well phrase. I'm sure there's plenty of college graduates that can identify with that one. Let's talk now just as we wrap up about the fact that, okay, you've selected on spiral light for the install, we addressed flow rate. We've addressed the structure just from an advantage standpoint. I feel like peace of mind is one of those two that goes kind of under understated because the life of this product, 50 to 100 years is going to keep a lot of headaches out of your cable. Yeah, One of the things that we really don't talk about enough is what is the design life? Yeah, what's the design life of a paved invert? I think. You know, you talk to people in the industry, you're going to get different answers, but it's probably five, ten, 15 years. You've extended life, you spent some amount of money. So we look at close fit liners and again, they have their place and they may have a 50 year design life if things things are installed properly. You deal with all the issues, you've got the structural component, address you got a 50 year design life and it cost you, you know, 25% less than a slip slip water. But I've got 100 year design life. I've got a pipe that normally is pressure pipe, 100 year design life when it's not been it, it's not been alive, it's not been engineered, it's not been a thing except, you know, a platform was built in 1950. So we're what, 75 years? How do you get a hundred year design life? It's it's, you know, the complex math of stress regression curves. But they know and we've advanced the material a lot in the last 20 or 25 years anyway, But we're fairly confident we've got a hundred years of life. So, okay, I've got a 50 year design life calls me 100 bucks a third, I've got 100 year design. Life cost me 150 bucks a foot. You know, in the end, did someone consider that as far as their design methodology, their consideration? You know, sometimes you only got enough money for a hundred bucks a foot. You're not going to spend 250. But, you know, I think most people, when they solve a problem, they like to solve a problem make sure their children, their grandchildren don't have to to address it. So there is a design life component that we don't talk about enough that should be considered when when comparing alternate work options. And Don, I think that was a great piece of punctuation to set on this. And aside from that, I guess I'll just see if there's anything you want to add because I really appreciate your time. I think it's an intriguing subject. I'm from out West. I do a lot of driving and fly fishing in the mountains and you just you can't look left and right without seeing culverts all over the place. And I know there's a lot of work to be done, and hopefully we've given you some ideas of some of the solutions. And I want to encourage you that if you have questions about Snap or Spiral or slip Lightning or maybe some other products, to please visit our website and and listen to our our insights webinars and and find any information you can about anything you want to add. Yeah, well, I like to give credit. I think it was an Alabama dot the head of the Alabama dot talked about you know being a dot uh, employee is a it's a good Sunday drive sport and the same, same for me you know now when you drive in you had a little dip in the road. You're like, well, that's probably a fairly cool, uh, so, so things aren't there. But I'd like to just add for the resources. You know, we can talk a lot about things, but yeah, we put probably if we were asked about, we put more information that helps all of our competitors. But the design manual, a design guide, the technical design manual has everything that we've talked about from a from a hydraulic, from a structural, from a install it, from a grouting. Yeah, we've revised that and published the latest revision March of this year. Put a lot of work in that and it's, you know it's, it's really a go to resource for the whole industry. If somebody is doing flat lining and they're using polyethylene, I guarantee you they probably looked at it and thought that's not a bad idea, that that's some good information. And then we have the install guide, which is really meant it's a pocket guide meant for the the guy it's shaped. So it can fit in the back pocket. It gives a, you know, if I was doing a job, it's got a material list, it's got a method of, of a, of work that's in there that says, Hey, have you considered this, What about grouting? And if it leaks, you know, the things that before they get started that would be good to address and and and has recommendations for for installing a pipe effectively those two resources are probably more information is drinking from a fire hose but it's it's worthwhile to someone who's who's considering you know I'm intrigued by the snap tie. Um I have heard about these other methods, but let me learn a little bit more about these other methods. But I'm not sure I'm getting value for my money, whatever it is, look at those and then give us a shot. We'll go in the field. We've got we've got ready to distribute, you know, spaced out throughout the country. Depends upon the relationship we had. And then myself and Ryan Herrington with this go will cover, you know, the Southeast, the Midwest and all the parts that our reps and distributors don't cover and even go with them. We like to get out in the field, tell you if we think we're a good solution or not, we're not going to we're not going to put our product someplace where we don't think it's good. It's got to survive. Absolutely not to sound cliche, but hey, we're here to help and hopefully that was helpful. Don McGriff, thanks so much for your time, Rob. Thanks for tuning in to our Insights podcast. Look forward to joining you next time. Take care.